Bad Reviews

Had my first bad review the other day.  It was for "die Stunde X", an alternative history novel I wrote when I was 24/25.  Incidentally, I've just finished writing the follow-up to it, but that's a whole different story.

Now, this bad review affected me because, as a writer, all I have is my ability to put words down on paper in an exciting and sensible order to create something readable.  But this person, well, to cut a long story short, he said that I switched tenses and that somebody like me, with no grasp of grammar, shouldn't be writing books.  I pondered on his criticism.  No, scratch that, I raged on his criticism for a few days.  And then I read his other reviews, and realized that he'd said pretty much the same thing about every other Indie writer he'd read.  The crux of his criticism are these.  Firstly, he doesn't like "Americanisms".  Well, friend, get with the modern age.  Notwithstanding the fact that I wrote "die Stunde X" twenty years ago, the majority of British writers are going to be affected by "Americanisms".  We're living in the 21st century.  It's how things are.  The second thing he has a problem with are continuous tenses.  In particular, he doesn't like people writing, "He was sat over there," or "He was stood right there."  Now, of course, everyone who has studied English even just to secondary school level will know that these are grammatically incorrect.  One would not say, "He was ran over there."  Rather, you would say, "He was running over there."  However, for reasons that can only be explained away by local dialect, by use of the vernacular, people do actually say, "I was stood right there ..."  It's the way people speak.  Though it most definitely frowned upon by the Oxford English Dictionary, even they recognize that its usage is rife not only in UK newspapers, but also on the BBC.  Call it slang, call it a bastardization of the English language, but that's the way things evolve.  Incidentally, I'm presuming that this critic of my work would also take umbrage to me using "-ize" rather than "-ise".  God knows I've been pulled up so many times for this in the past, but a simple bit of research will demonstrate that not only is "-ize" acceptable British-English, it is also how we used to write things.  Indeed, this is one case where the Brits have got lazy whereas the Americans are sticking to the original spelling.

But in any case, back to the original topic.  This critic.  Now, not only has he stated (and I'm paraphrasing here) that I'm a useless writer, mainly because, as a self-elected member of the grammar police, he has decided that I don't follow certain rules, he's also done the same to many other Indie writers.  The thing is, these guys have sat down and written books.  They're Indie writers and we all give them a certain amount of leeway.  Unlike like Grisham and Rowling, they don't have a fantastic editorial team behind them to spot these transgressions of continuous tenses and the spelling mistakes (I actually spotted eight in Stephen King's last novel, but what the hell, people shrug because he's a famous writer).  What they have done, however, is sat down and written a book.  And to those who have never done that, I would say this.  Don't criticize mercilessly until you have attempted to write a book yourself.  I've written ten, and I think I've learnt a lot since 1994, when I wrote "die Stunde X".  Now, I write generally in first person, where I can definitely say, "I was stood over there," because that's common vernacular, and that's the way my lead character would speak.  The thing is, the people this guy writes off, maybe they're just starting out, and what they do not need is some banal, three-sentence review telling people that they're basically shit at writing English, and they should go away and do something else.  To this person, I would say this.  If you want to read something which is finely polished, but ultimately soulless, then purchase books by writers who are published through mainstream publishers, rather than Indie writers or those published through smaller labels.  That way, rather than spending £8 on four books which you will absolutely criticize (but would probably actually enjoy if you ditched the grammar police spectacles), you will spend £8 on one book which is so finely crafted, you won't have to criticize it.

In conclusion, I'd say this.  Just read and enjoy.  Stop worrying about being a member of the grammar police.  And sentences can start with "and". Sat over there is a copy of my latest book.  But I just remember, you said that sentences can't start with "sat" or "stood" or "but".  But why not?  Rules are meant to be broken.  And the greatest writers in the world break those rules for literary effect.  And unless you've actually written a book, perhaps you should just sit down in your accepted role as "reader", and read, rather than edit and criticize.

And remember - there has never been a monument to a critic.

PS - I apologize for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors.  And (I shouldn't start a sentence with "and", but for effect (being that this is a forgotten addition to the previous sentence) I have done) typos (was it worth the wait?).  Please don't pull me up on them.  Once I stopped being a member of the grammar police, I enjoyed myself a lot more and people hated me a lot less.

Characters

When I write a character, I generally have this person in my head, what he looks like, how he acts, what his personality is like.  They usually become my best friends.  Rob Murgatroyd, Benjamin Beerenwinkel, Saul Castle, even Alex Savage.  Some say that there is something of me in every one of the lead characters I've written, and perhaps there is.  But here's the thing.  Though I create these lead characters, I have no idea how other people will perceive them.

Benjamin Beerenwinkel, for example, was one of my favourites.  He was a writer with cancer.  His coping mechanism?  Alcohol and self-destruction.  But the feedback I got was that he was this selfish guy, self-obsessed, someone you could really get to like.  He did bad things and he blamed everyone else for them.  Me, I thought he was a nice guy, but maybe I was biased.

Danny McIllvoy, who was obsessed with one of his work colleagues.  Did people think he was pathetic or was he a man madly in love with a beautiful woman?  Did he just want to save her from the troubles she was going through or was he a sad case?

I wonder what people thought of Rob Murgatroyd, the investigative journalist who'd lost his family in a horrific car crash.  I suppose he was on a mission of self-destruction too.  But no one ever told me what they thought of him as a person.

Alex Savage, the ex-SAS soldier, now a hitman.  Divorced, two sons.  Ruthless and yet flawed.  Did people like him?  No one ever said.

And now Saul Castle, a former teacher now down on his luck, addicted to alcohol, seeking redemption.  Saul doesn't blame anyone for the mistakes he's made in the past.  He's very open about what he has done.  Maybe he's too open.  He's seeking redemption, but what do people think of him?  Is he weak?  Does he deserve to be where he is?  Does he deserve to be judged, or should be give him a chance to make his life better?

See, when people tell me they don't like one of my characters, I'm slightly offended.  But I'm not offended because they dislike somebody I've created - that, in itself, is actually wondered, that someone I've invented can generate an emotion from someone who reads about them.  I'm offended because I see these guys as my friends.  I like them, for all their flaws.

But how about you tell me what you think of these guys?  I'd be intrigued to find out.

Maggie's Children is out and I'm sober.

You can now buy Maggie's Children in either Kindle format or as a paperback.

A link to the Kindle version which is available at Amazon.

This book wasn't as tough to write as Besotted, but it was still a drain.  Right now, I'm working on nach Schema F, the sequel to die Stunde X.  This is an alternative history novel, and is completely different to the transgressive stuff I've been writing for the last few years.  I like to think of it as a bit of a yarn, a romp, something you can read, be entertained by, and then toss to one side and forget.  It's no secret that die Stunde X is my bestseller, and I suppose it's only natural that I should write a sequel, though it has been 20 years since I wrote DSX.  Call it a shrewd marketing move, but I like to think that I'm writing a book that some people have been asking for.  From a writer's perspective, it's also a fun book to write.  I reckon I'll have the first draft finished by the end of October, and it should definitely be out in time for Christmas.

I'm also going sober for October, for Macmillan Cancer Support.  Last year I raised almost £200, but this year it's slow-going.  I'm guessing that a lot of people are doing charitable things, and everyone's fed up with it.  But if you could see your way to donating something, I'd be grateful.

You can go here to make a donation - https://www.gosober.org.uk/profile/shaunmartin.

Maggie's Children

Well, the first draft of "Maggie's Children" is finished.  This here is the first version of the cover.  The book has taken me about 4 months to complete, but there's still a long way to go.  It'll go through second and third drafts and then it'll get proof-read.  As it is, it's not ready.

I wrote it with a pen in some Moleskine notebooks - two of them, in fact. 230 pages, 90,000 words. Writing longhand is a very honest way of writing.  Plus it's easier than lugging a laptop around.  I found that I just threw sentences down onto the paper, and I'll decide at the second draft stage whether they're worth keeping.  I really want to know what people will make of this novel.  It's a strange one, stranger even than "Besotted".

Here's what's going to be difficult - writing the blurb for the back cover.  What can I write without giving too much away?  Well, the book is about a man called Saul Castle.  We meet him when he's in his forties, is an alcoholic, and is just about to attend the funeral of a friend.  It seems as though Saul Castle's life has been dotted with tragedies.

This book didn't affect me the way "Besotted" did.  Of course, I used some events of my life to pad this story out - what writer doesn't - but I didn't have to become Saul Castle in order to write it.  In that respect, it was moderately easy to complete.  But the next huge step is the most difficult one - letting people read it.

It should be ready around September time, so keep watching this space.

I Like Reading the Daily Mail, See ...

I like reading the Daily Mail, see

It tells me how things in the world are and how things in the world should be

There’s people out there who don’t like it

They find it offensive ‘cause they don’t agree

But the things they like, the things they say and read, perhaps they might be offensive to me

That’s why I like reading the Daily Mail, see?

It tells me that these immigrants are over here stealing all of our jobs

It tells me the Lithuanians and Bulgarians, the Albanians too, are always on the rob

And then it goes and tells me that all us British blokes are just workshy slobs

And at the same time, all of our politicians are just toffee-nosed snobs

I suppose some people might call it journalistic hypocrisy

But I think it’s just like those journalists are talking to guys like me

And I still like reading the Daily Mail, see?

It could be because of the Union Jack and my British nationality

Or maybe it’s ‘cause I love our dear old Royal Family

I mean, they may be rich and privileged, but they’re British, just like you and me

They have their Sunday roasts and they’re always drinking cups of tea

The Daily Mail says it, so that’s the way it must be

And then sometimes I wonder why I like reading the Daily Mail, see.

Why England Loses

I like playing football, but I like driving Bentleys too

See, I like getting paid lots of money too

I used to kick a ball around for me school

But back then, it were a different kind of rule

Back then, we used to play for fun

We didn’t used to play for money

We used to like the glory

The idea of getting kissed by the girls from the school

But that don’t happen now

Now, we have WAGs

We have birds who ain’t just common, council estate slags

Well, they might be, but they’re more classy

But then, that’s the problem, ain’t it?

I’m not thinking about football

I’m thinking about all these other bits and pieces

Which probably explains why England always  loses.

This Fashionable Man

These clothes, designer labels, tee-shirts, by Bench, by FCUK, by DKNY,
These shirts by Dolce & Gabbana, by Ben Sherman, by Yves St Laurent,
These jeans, these trousers, by Jack and Jones, by G Star, by Diesel,
The contents of this wardrobe, expensive, no money spared,
Indicative of someone who cared.
These creases, these ruffles, these collars, cuffs and hems all frayed,
These colours faded, pink not red, no longer black but grey,
These jeans once new and fashionable, threadbare now,
Worn by a man once loved, a man now dressed by people paid to be there,
Now hidden away, forgotten, by those supposed to care.

Being lazy ...

Being lazy is not good.  I'm currently thinking up any old excuse to not write.  Writing this blog post is one such excuse.  Before that, it was the trolling I was doing on my Facebook page with regards the recent elections.  Then it's typing up the handwritten draft of my current novel, "Maggie's Children".  Then it's research.  Then it's working on the screenplay for "Besotted".  Then it's writing toxic poetry.  Any old excuse to not write.

I'm at that stage with "Maggie's Children" where I was with "Besotted".  I don't think it's good enough, I think the characters are shit, etc etc, but then people told me "Besotted" was a very good book, so I guess I may well just be suffering from self-doubt.  I'm about 47,000 words into the book (having to estimate, because I haven't finished typing up what I've currently written)and it's about halfway through - well, perhaps it might just scrape past 85,000 words.  "Besotted" was a behemoth of a book, almost 130,000 words long.  I don't think "Maggie's Children" needs to be such a thick novel.

The thing is, writing this book is emotionally draining.  Whilst I'm not "becoming" Saul Castle in the same way as I virtually became Benjamin Beerenwinkel, the subject matter is depressing.  I'm hoping that, like some people's real depression, the mood will sink low, and then be followed by a euphoria as the book reaches its climax.  Or will it?  See, I haven't really got an ending for the book.  Not yet.  I know what's happened in Saul Castle's history, but I don't know what will happen to him in the future.

I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

Well, if I can stop being lazy ...

Judgementalism

See, this is how it is.  At the heart of it, my next book, "Maggie's Children", is about people being judgemental.  It's about people forming opinions of others based upon the minimal amount of knowledge.  I know that people will read it and form their own opinions.  But what I'm trying to do is make Saul Castle, the lead character, such a nice, engaging person, that I'm hoping you, the reader, won't be shocked when "it all comes out".

Here's the thing.  The majority of us, we are judgemental.  We form our opinions on limited knowledge.  We don't want to give people a chance.  We'd rather base our opinions on what other people have told us, on what we've read.  I've been a victim of judgementalism.  I am a convicted drink driver.  Worse than that, I was convicted for a second time.  Now, anybody who knows me well will testify that I took my punishment with aplomb.  I don't seek to attribute blame elsewhere, and the report of my absurd behaviour on that particular evening makes shocking reading, but even the police officers who arrested me accepted it because I was drunk.  Alcohol does bad things to some people.  But people have consistently judged me for what happened on that fateful night, late December 2011.  I've kind of given up on arguing my case - it's a losing battle.  And in the grand scheme of things, people who don't know me, do I care what they think of me?  Not at all.  I was a twat.  My friends, my family even, will say that I was a twat (or something akin to that, if they don't swear).  But to be honest, I'm kind of pissed off with people judging me.  I had people saying, "You could've killed somebody."  Yeah, but I didn't.  And when a person is arrested for being drunk and disorderly and a little bit lairy in the town centre, nobody says to them, "Yeah, but you could've got into a fight and killed somebody."  It's all relative.  Call me a twat, call me a cunt even, but don't escalate my crime beyond what it was.

And then, back to my next book.  There is a lot of judgementalism in there.  And I'm not just talking about drinking and driving.  It goes far deeper than that.  When it comes out, read it, read about Saul Castle, read about what he goes through, and then think about that statement, which I'll have to paraphrase because, ho ho, I've had a couple of beers, but it's something about not judging a man unless you've walked a few miles in his shoes.

I'll leave you with that thought.

For charity

Not sure how much it will be worth, but it will be for Macmillian Cancer Support, a charity close to my heart.  But when I finish the first handwritten draft of "Maggie's Children", I will be auctioning it off for charity.  It may well only raise a few quid, but what you will be getting (if you're the winning bidder) is the raw first draft of a book.  You will be able to tell by my handwriting when I've been pissed (the handwriting gets bigger, the space between words larger).  You will be able to see the juvenile writings before a book goes into edit.  You will see the beer stains, the misspellings, the bad grammar, all of that stuff that occurs when a writer is "in the zone", just throwing the words and ideas onto the page.  It is kind of like letting you know what it's like to be in the mind of a writer desperately trying to just throw those words down on the paper.  Oh, I'm sorry - I think I repeated myself.

See, I'm not Stephen King, but I guarantee you that I sweat just as much as he does when he writes his first draft.  I become the people in my books, even if it's only fleetingly.  This first draft, I'm not prepared to give it up for a tenner, for twenty quid, for a pony even.  This is worth more than that.  This is a monkey, at least.  Keep watching this space, and then when the first draft is finished, and you're bidding for it, know that it's an important document, and more than that, it's going to be important to the people who will benefit from it, from the money it will raise.  This first draft deserves to go to a) a fan (that's a given) but also b) somebody who recognizes the importance of what their money will bring to people.

Keep fucking watching this space ...

The Frustration of a Writer

I get frustrated.  And I'm not talking about sexual frustration.  I'm talking about when it comes to writing.  I have these ideas in my head, and I have to get them down in paper, but it takes so long.  As I'm writing down the latest chapter, my mind is already fixated on the next chapter, desperately wanting to reach the climax.  But as with sex, that could be like experiencing a premature ejaculation.  Rush it, and it won't be so good.  Yeah, yeah, I understand that.  But I can only really begin to craft the story once the first draft is down on paper.  Then I can caress and stroke it until it becomes something really special.

But I desperately want that first draft down on paper.  Only then can I sit back and feel satisfied.  Only then can the story leave my mind.  See, at the moment, I think that "Maggie's Children" will be even more powerful than "Besotted".  I want to get it out there, I want other people to read it, to talk to me about it, to tell me what they liked, what they didn't like (and sometimes, the things they don't like about my books, they can be a surprise - other times, getting them to not like a certain scene, a certain character, was a deliberate act).  Oh there will be plenty of things in "Maggie's Children" that people won't like, but that's completely my intention.  Transgressive fiction should leave a nasty taste in people's mouths every now and again.

But right now, I'm frustrated.  Today, I've written perhaps 1,500 words.  Not a fantastic day so far, but I'm sat at my desk, Moleskine notebook in front of me, my trusty Parker pen at the ready, and I know I will get at least a couple more chapters done before I switch off the light.  But that's not enough.  I set myself a target of getting this book finished by June, but I want the first draft finished by the middle of May.  I'm not sure I'll achieve that, but I have to at least try - I have to try to get rid of this frustration.  I know that once I put down my Parker for the last time, I will have this big, fuck-off smile on my face.  I will achieved something special.  I will have finished a book.

And "Maggie's Children" will blow away everyone who reads it.

From book to film ...

Working on too many things at the moment, but that's the way my mind works.  Firstly, there's "Maggie's Children" and "nach Schema F", the two books I want to get finished in the next couple of months.  I think it's good to set myself a target, and I think it's definitely achievable to have both of those books finished by the end of June - well, the first drafts, anyway.

But then there's "Besotted".  Okay, so "Besotted", as a book, is finished.  But I want to write "Besotted", the screenplay.  I've never developed one of my books into a screenplay before.  I'm not actually convinced that I can do it, but if nothing else it's a form of mental masturbation.  For one thing, I reckon the finished screenplay will be way too long.  I'm not convinced I can be objective enough to remove characters or scenes.  I've also got to consider whether Benjamin Beerenwinkel should do a voice-over.  I don't really like voice-overs in films.  Film is a different medium to the written word, and voice-overs, I find, just seem to emphasize what the actor's expressions should be telling us.  We cannot get into the mind of the character when we're watching a film, but that's a limitation that every great film has had to deal with.  So far, I'm only on page 21 of the book, but that's been condensed down to 6 pages of script.  That's six minutes of screen time.  I reckon I could get the first draft down to perhaps 130 pages, but that's too long.  Once the first draft is complete, it'll be time to get that big red pen out and hack away at unnecessary scenes or pieces of dialogue.  And then, after that, it might need to be passed around to enthusiastic people prepared to offer feedback.

I've just got this feeling that "Besotted" is the one book I've written which is more accessible in film format.  Oh yeah, "die Stunde X" would look awesome on screen, but that would cost millions to make.  I reckon "Besotted" could be made for a few thousand.  Some of you might already be aware that my alter-ego, Shaun Martin, makes films.  I recently read an interview with director Matt Bloom, who basically said that any aspiring film-maker should make one film every month for two years, before attempting to make their "big film".  His view is that in making those 24 films - which you should not show to anybody in the film industry - you will make lots of mistakes, but you will learn by them.  He said after doing this you should not make another film until you can be a perfectionist.  I think he's right.  With every film that Shaun Martin has made, there have been mistakes - things forgotten, rules broken, days rushed, lack of budget.  But I reckon by the time a decent enough budget is assembled so that "Besotted" can be filmed, he'll have made a few more shorts, and he will have learnt a lot from the mistakes he's made in the past.

But anyway, I'm rambling when I should be working.  Just keep watching this space.  I want my creative output to have been massive in 2014.  Three books, a couple of short films (I don't reckon Shaun Martin will have the time to follow Matt Bloom's advice to the letter!) and the preparation laid for a fantastic 2015.  What will 2015 bring?  Well, let me be optimistic and ambitious - two feature films.  "Besotted" and "In Amongst the Natives".

Addicted ... (oh, and write what you know about ... kind of)

Am I addicted to writing?

Yes, I am.  I write everywhere I go.  I write about everything.  But I also write a whole lot of shit.  See, I'm not that intelligent.  I can't argue with the Etonians of this world.  There are many things about which I know very little.  And there are two totally unrelated topics - and yet, to me, they are related.

See, I like writing books.  And I do write about what I know, or about what I think I know (in the case of researching stuff).  I like writing dark, occasionally horrific stuff.  I like writing about messed-up, middle-aged men, because that's what I am.  And even if I'm not living the life of Rob Murgatroyd, Benjamin Beerenwinkel or Danny McIlvoy, I do know what makes them tick, and because I'm a writer with an imagination, I can kind of put myself in their heads and try to work out what they're doing.  See, that's the thing.  Write what you know.  And many of the anecdotes in those particular books were based on things I'd either heard or done ...

So that's a lesson learnt.  If you can't use your imagination to completely construct a new world or a situation (such as, in my case, "die Stunde X", or "For the Love of the Devil") then write about a man that could be you.

But here's the thing.  I just bloody love writing.  And writers are opinionated.  We write opinions, and they're not always our own.  So occasionally, I will write on somebody else's blog, or somebody else's Facebook, and I will comment, but invariably I find myself out of my depth, either because I'm not as intellectually aware as the people I'm talking to, or because I'm not actually in the "character".  See, I don't know about rocket science, or economics, or brain surgery, because I haven't researched it, because I'm not writing a book.  I can't get into that character, because it doesn't motivate me.

And trust me, I've got into character a few times.  I became Rob Murgatroyd like you would not fucking believe.  How can you know about those Internet gore videos unless you watch them?  How can you write about being addicted to them unless you become addicted to them?  How can you say what your lead character feels like when he's snorted coke or got utterly fucked off his face on alcohol (such as Benjamin Beerenwinkel did in "Besotted") unless you do it?  You can't.  Sometimes, you have to become the person you're writing about.

I'm writing about Saul Castle now.  Saul Castle, he's an alcoholic.  He's had a very tough life.  Perhaps the only thing I can really relate to is his massive alcohol consumption and the fact that he spends a lot of time thinking about the bad things in his life.

See, what I like about writing about these tough characters is that I can get into their mindset without leading their lives.  I didn't lose my wife and children in a horrific car crash like Rob Murgatroyd did, but I could write about him getting coked up and meeting some East End gangster whilst becoming addicted to Internet gore.  I didn't get involved in a relationship with a woman who was being sexually, mentally and physically abused by her boyfriend, like Danny McIllvoy did, but I have felt as low as him because of women.  And I didn't suffer from cancer or have some young, teenage girl become besotted with me, like Benjamin Beerenwinkel, but I have been (and still am) a struggling writer.  Saul Castle, well, I can't even begin to tell you what he's been through, but I'm kind of walking in his shoes.  Saul is a nice guy.  When you read about Saul, be nice to him.  Benjamin Beerenwinkel, he was an arsehole and, I dunno, maybe it's good that he's no longer around - but Saul?  I think of Saul as being the part of me that's vulnerable to criticism, the part that has been deeply affected by all of the bad stuff that's happened.  In a way, all of my characters, they're my children.

But back to the other part ... addicted to writing.

Lesson to self.  Don't get involved in shit about economics or rocket science or generally shit that you know nothing about.  At the end of the day, who cares?!

How's it going?

Well, I'm working on two books at the moment.  Firstly, the sequel to alternative history novel "die Stunde X", which will be called "nach Schema F".  I'm writing that on my computer, and it's about 38,000 words in.  Just under halfway, I think.  The first book was a tight, fast-paced thriller.  In the follow-up, I'm developing the characters more - my writing style has changed significantly since 1994, when I wrote "die Stunde X".  I hope, however, it will still please fans waiting for a follow-up.  I've also got an idea for the third in the trilogy, but I don't want to talk too much about that.

Secondly, I'm working on a transgressive fiction book called "Maggie's Children".  I'm writing this with pen and paper.  I'm about 25,000 words into it, so about a third of the way through it.  I write this one when I'm out and about - in a pub at lunchtime, it a pub after work (yes, like most writers, I have a day job).  This book is about a guy called Saul Castle, and the friends he met at university.  But Saul has had a turbulent past, one he's still, at the age of 45, trying to come to terms with.  We meet Saul as he is waiting to attend a friend's funeral, and we follow him as he falls in love again.  Along the way, he tells us about his past, about his former wife, Sara, and their children.  I think that because Benjamin Beerenwinkel was such a loathsome character, I want to write about someone who is the antithesis to him.  Saul is a nice guy.  He's also an alcoholic (though he won't admit that - it's that whole 'unreliable narrator' thing going on), but when you finally find out what he's been through you'll forgive him.  Basically, it's a tragic love story, and a perfect novel to write after "Besotted".  I actually enjoy writing about guys in their forties who have had a shit life - I guess that's because it's a perfect way to describe me.

"Besotted" took me almost 18 months to write, but then there was the whole 'getting mugged' thing to come to terms with.  I hope to have the first drafts of both "nach Schema F" and "Maggie's Children" completed by July, but there will be lots more work after that to ensure that they're both fit for readership consumption.  I know what you're thinking - you're thinking, "How the fuck can you write two books at once?"  Well, at the moment, I'm reading three books - Amis's "Money", Picoult's "The Storyteller", and (for my shame) McNab's "Silencer".  I find it easy, and very stimulating, to dip into more than one book at once.  And when it comes to writing, it's the perfect solution to writer's block to have more than one book on the go.

I know that "Maggie's Children" is going to be a tough book to write - as challenging and draining as "Besotted" was - but hopefully it will be as well received.  "nach Schema F", on the other hand, is just a gripping yarn, a fantasy, something to lose myself in, to not take too seriously.

When these two books are done, what next?  Well, I'm 140,000 words (perhaps halfway) into "Dark Satanic Mills", my magnum opus.  That's a book that I really want to get finished, and hopefully working on "nach Schema F" will encourage me to open up that particular Word document and get it finished.

2012 and 2013 were shit years production-wise.  2014, I intend to redress the balance.

Keep watching this space.

Oh Lucky Me

I am fortunate.

I am fortunate in that I am surrounded by creative people.  I know writers, film directors, song writers, singers, musicians, actors.  All of them, each and every one of them, they create something.  Some of them, they might not be as prolific as me, but in each and every case I offer them encouragement.  Tonight, one of my friends (who has a day job that is stressful, rewarding, and not always respected) has told me he wants to write songs again.  It's been too long.  I told him that.  I hope he picks up a guitar and starts writing again.  I want to hear his work.

This is what us creative people should be with one another.  Supportive, cajoling, perhaps even oppressive.  Occasionally, creative people need a kick up the arse to remind that a) they have talent and b) they should be using it.

But I am lucky to be surrounded by creative people.

Only the other night, a singer/songwriter came round to see me, and I had some motor racing channel on.  He said, "I thought you were leading this Bohemian lifestyle, getting pissed and writing, not sitting there watching racing cars."  He had a point. There was me, writing more words on Facebook than in the current books I was endeavoring to write.

But us creative people, we procrastinate, we look for any excuse NOT to create.

We should pick up our pens, our guitars, our pencils and paint brushes, and we should create.

This one goes out to the nameless many ... the people I know.

The Arrogance of a Writer

Someone recently told me that I wasn't as good a writer as J.K. Rowling, and that she's a far superior storyteller.  Perhaps she is, if you like stories about schoolboys who happen to be wizards.  Personally, I think this person was trying to bring me down to earth.

You see, I write books.  I'm arrogant.  I think most writers have to be, because there is something quite arrogant and self-assured about writing a book, or even a short story, and then setting it loose in the world so other people can read it and pass judgement.  I have to be arrogant, because that way when people say they don't like what I've written, when people criticize my work, or (heaven forbid) tell me that J.K. Rowling is a better writer than me, it never penetrates my thick skin.  It doesn't hurt me.

Here's the thing.  I think I am as good as J.K. Rowling.  I think I'm as good as John Grisham or Stephen King.  I think I'm on a par with Charles Bukowski.  If I didn't think that, then why would I carry on writing?  How could I have written 8 books?  And because these people are selling millions of copies of their books, does that mean that their talent is bigger than mine?  That they are more talented than the myriad Indie writers tirelessly pushing their work on the Kindle?  There is something to be said about a person who writes because they can, rather than because they have a six-book deal with a major publishing house.  Sure, these guys are not as polished as the Rowlings and Grishams of the world, but that's because they haven't had their work looked over and, dare I say it (from a writer's perspective), savaged (and polished) by a professional and experienced editor.  See, when I wrote my last book, "Besotted", I felt that I had produced the best work I could.  Naturally, it has a few frayed edges, but that's what a professional editor sorts out.  Without that valuable input, this is how an Indie writer rolls.

I think as I've got older, I've become to care less and less about what people think about me or about my work.  I wrote "die Stunde X" when I was 25.  In a way, it's a work of young adult fiction.  The lead character is in his early twenties, much as I was.  It's still my best seller (hence me currently working on a sequel - I think 20 years is long enough for people to have to wait!), and people have said that it's a pretty good story.  But I guess it's not as good a story as Harry Potter and the Wizard's Sleeve, because I'm not as good a storyteller as Rowling!  Back in 1994/1995, when the book was completed, I might've taken that to heart.  But as a 45 year old writer, such criticism is just water off a duck's back.  And whilst it might not have the thrills and suspense of "die Stunde X", I'm arrogant enough to think that "Besotted" is a pretty damn fine story as well, one written for adults rather than small children and grown-ups who like to read children's books.  And everybody who reads it can remember the name of the lead character.  Am I upset when people criticize my books?  No.  In a way, if their criticism is justified, I love it.  I love people talking to me about my books, what they enjoyed, what they didn't enjoy.  I'm not so convinced that J.K. Rowling gets such honesty from the people who talk to her about her books - just obsequious sycophants telling her how awesome her latest book is.  Me, I like nothing better than getting pissed with someone as they tell me about my last book - in vino veritas, they will tell me what was wrong with it too.  Would I ever want to give that up?  Definitely not.

Here's my advice to anyone who considers themselves to be a writer.  Become arrogant.

Writing shorts

Writing a novel is a monumental task.  I should know.  I've written a few.  My last book, "Besotted", took me nigh on 18 months to complete.  Of course, regular followers will know that I was mugged in January 2013, and lost much of the original manuscript, but that doesn't alter the fact that it took up a lot of my time.  Days and nights spent writing, other days and nights spent trying to break through that writer's block, yet more days and nights spent drinking vodka, becoming my character, Benjamin Beerenwinkel.  The weeks spent editing and redrafting, fine-tuning the book, and finally the publication.

Now, in the past, I've written lots.  Even during "Besotted", there were days when I wrote 10,000 words.  I've generally been able to deliver the first draft of a full novel within 3-4 months.  But as I said, it's a monumental task.

Short stories, on the other hand, are easier to finish.  But a short story needs something special.  You have 2,000-4,000 words to deliver a tale to the reader.  Lots of shorts, they don't have that whole beginning, middle and end bullshit.  They just have a concept.  They should grab the reader, give them a bit of a shake, and then put them back down.

I'm working on a collection of shorts at the moment, entitled "Crime and Irresponsibility".  A couple of the stories have appeared on my previous blog.  Three of them have been developed into screenplays and have been shot as short films.  One of the stories, "Life", is actually more of a novella (and is another of my stories that I'd like to develop as a screenplay).  At the moment, all of the stories in the collection deal with crime or situations that have come about because of the irresponsible behaviour of the protagonist.  I used to work as a prison officer, on the lifer wing.  Some of the tales (some of which haven't been written yet) deal with the crimes committed by the men I met inside.

The thing with shorts is that you can write them really quickly, see something materialize in a short space of time.  You don't agonize over them, or wonder for weeks how you're going to end them.  You start to write them and if you're halfway through and you fall out of love with the story, you've not invested so much time that you have to finish it.  You can just leave it, maybe return to it, or just ditch it.  I've started to write novels, been 40,000 words in, and given up.  The writer's world is full of unfinished novels.  Short stories, on the other hand, well, they're easier to finish.  They're like quickies.  You start writing, you build up the tension in your head, let the words flow through your fingertips to the keyboard, and then, orgasmically, you complete the story.

I would say to any writer who is struggling with his or her writing, if they're partway through a novel, put that to one side and write a short story.  Call it mental masturbation.  Even if you don't show anybody else the short story, you're practicing your writing.  You're finding your writing voice, and it's a damn sight easier to find in a short story than at the start of the monumental task of writing a novel.

Also, there's the opportunity to get short stories published in collections, in magazines, if monetary gain is your aim.

As I struggle to write another novel (and I do aim to finish 3 this year, 2014), writing shorts is a good way to keep my creative juices flowing.

Sequels and series ...

Let me get this part out of the way first, before I go all hypocritical.  I fucking hate sequels.  I hate writers who publish their first book and call it, "Book Title 1", the first in a series of books featuring ...

Fuck that shit.  What happens if your first book isn't a success?  You're gonna look a bit of a twat (and also feel pretty fucking disheartened) writing and publishing a follow-up.

So, after that ... here comes the hypocrisy.  "The Journal".  I followed that up a few years later with "Journals" (which wasn't that good, to be fair).  Fans of mine (yes, I do have a few) have been asking for sequels to "die Stunde X" and "For the Love of the Devil", and I must confess that I have started writing follow ups for both of those.  Both, naturally, are languishing on my hard drive somewhere.  "Blood Money" was written with the intention of writing a "series of books featuring Alex Savage".  I did write a follow-up, but it needs a lot of work before it's ready to parade itself in front of readers.

I guess in a sense I'm averse to the cynical idea of writing a book with the intention of turning it into three books, when once could suffice, or the notion of rehashing the same characters, because it's far easier than inventing a new character.  A true sequel shouldn't come about immediately.  When I wrote "die Stunde X", I wasn't thinking about a sequel.  Similarly with "For the Love of the Devil", there was no plan to write a follow-up.  But some people, they either love the characters you've written, or you've left a book with an open ending and they want it resolving, as I did with "The Journal".  I personally love a couple of my characters.  I love Gaz Carmichael, one of the supporting characters in "Putrid Underbelly".  I love Benjamin Beerenwinkel from "Besotted".  But as a writer, am I that unimaginative that I can't think of any more characters?  That I have to regurgitate the ones I've already created?

Hmm, perhaps I am, because this year, 2014, I definitely smell a sequel to "die Stunde X", tentatively entitled "nach Schema F" (look it up and then consider whether I'm joking ...)

What about that Internet then?

I'm bored with the Internet.  There, I'll say it.  And yet, I bet you don't believe me.  But let's take a look at my current browsing history.  The BBC News website, BBC iPlayer, Amazon, YouTube, Netflix, Twitter, Facebook, Documenting Reality (yes, even after all these years, look after I've completed "Putrid Underbelly", I still pay it a visit), Peterborough United website, Stamford AFC website, a couple of job websites, Wikipedia, even Plenty of Fish, for fuck's sake.  But on the whole, unless I'm researching for a book, those are about the only sites I stumble across on a semi-regular basis.  I look at the news site in the hope that some big story has broken.  I check Amazon to see if there are any startlingly fantastic new books I should buy.  YouTube, I occasionally check for music videos.  Netflix and iPlayer (I'm amazed crApple haven't sued the BBC for using a small "i"), out of sheer boredom.  Twitter and Facebook, well, just for that social interaction (...).  PUFC and SAFC because they're my local football teams.  The job sites - well, isn't everybody looking for a new job?  Wikipedia, not the world's greatest encyclopedia, but a good starting point for research - gives you ideas of what to Google for.  And that's it.  Well, okay, I confess, occasionally I'll pay a visit to my own website (that's www.shaunstafford.co.uk to you).

So, there's this massive source of information out there, and I'm using just a tiny, minuscule fraction of it.

What's the point of the Internet?  Mostly, we still to what we're familiar with.  Nobody really goes surfing anymore.  You get your basic stuff from a handful of sites and you travel no further.  Nobody goes off the beaten track.  Christ, even the stuff I've checked out on Documenting Reality, some of that shit ends up on Facebook.  A bit of shopping, that's about as daring as people get.  See if you can get a tablet or a camera a couple of quid cheaper elsewhere.

I still recall those halcyon days of the Internet, where you waited an age for a page to load in, so you actually read it - the whole fucking thing - because you were on dial-up and it cost you money to download it.  Now, if we can't find the information on the landing page within a few seconds, we're liable to say, "Fuck this," flick back to the Google tab and click on another link.  Everything about our lives now is "fast".  Fast food, fast shopping, fast dating.  The POF people, they flick in and out of profiles, ditching most of them as though they're shopping for a pair of shoes.  A sentence to capture the interest of the person reading.  The same applies to books (if you haven't captured their interest in the first paragraph, you're fucked), and to music - why bother writing new stuff when the latest fast boy band can just churn out a cover version of a well-known classic, and churn it out fast ...

Why do we want to do everything so fast?  Is it because we can sense our own mortality now.  The Earth is billions of years old, but we're alive for less than a hundred years.  Is that why we want to rush everything?  Plenty of fish?  That saying was intended to help a person who'd been dumped by a partner.  "Ach, there's plenty more fish in the sea, pal."  It wasn't intended to be used as a line for a dating site.  "That's an ugly-assed fish - throw it back.  There's plenty more of them out there."

Most of us, we're not running out of time.  Not so much so that we can't waste a bit of time reading a book, finding something original to watch or listen to, or spending a bit of time actually getting to know somebody before we judge them.

Let me tell you, you're alive for eighty years.  That's still a long fucking time.

Slow down, chill out ...

... surf the web again.

The Importance of a Website

Let me get this bit out of the way first.  A website is far more important than Twitter.  A website contains a wealth of information about a writer (or at least, it should).

But here's the problem with websites.  If you have a shit host (as I currently do) then your website will go down more often than a Kings Cross prostitute.  And when do you know that your website's gone down?  Well, unless you're incredibly vain, and you check your website every couple of hours, you would have to wait for somebody to tell you.  But who's going to tell you?  After all, if your website is down, there is no way for anybody to email you.  Your email becomes non-working.  So while it's all very nice to have an email address such as shaun@shaunstafford.co.uk, if nobody can email me on it, what's the point?  The issue of a website being down is compounded further for an Indie writer because people will bang that URL into their browser, nothing will pop up, and they'll immediately think, "Fucking amateur."  And then they won't get to read anything about you or buy any more of your books.

I'm currently having diabolical issues with my hosting company.  The website just keeps going down, and I have to email the hosts and wait until they pull their finger out.  The latest outage, they fixed it so that the index page (or landing page) worked, but none of the others did.  I'd rather not waste time emailing the Internet hosts.  I shouldn't fucking have to.  They should be capable of doing their job.

I chose this particular company because they're based in the UK.  I guess it was just that "loyalty" thing.  But over the last few years, they've been particularly useless.  On one occasion the website was down for 2 weeks because they had some kind of server crash.  Now, things can go wrong.  That's obvious.  But 2 weeks to put it right?  How many people do this company employ?  I won't name them here, but they're a cheap company - the cheapest, even - and they're based in the UK.  I think once my hosting comes up for renewal, I'll migrate to another host.

Anyway, the importance of websites.  A website is like a glorified advert.  If a person googled "shaun stafford writer" my website would come up in the search.  It should be near the top.  This blog will also come up.  Twitter will be there too.  And all of those things should be right at the top.  But it's the website where most people will go for all of the information about me.  Now, I'm not saying my website - when it's actually working - is fantastic or high-tech, but it does everything a website is supposed to do.  And from there, people can visit this blog, and look at me on Twitter or Facebook.

A website is a useful tool when it comes to marketing your work.

But when the website is down, it just makes you, the writer, look like a tool.

Come on, UK-Cheapest, pull your fucking finger out.

Twitter or Twatter

I've brushed upon this before, but I feel compelled to do it again.  Twitter.  Is it actually worth wasting time on?

I'm convinced that nobody on my Twitter list actually reads any of my tweets.  How can they?  My tweets must get lost amongst the myriad marketing tweets from other Indie writers and associated spam.  Yet we have to maintain a Twitter presence, being writers, in spite of the fact that we're limited to 140 characters.  Yeah, right, try to find a writer who can only write 140 characters ...

Tonight, I was trying desperately to find a reviewer for my latest book, Besotted.  But 98% of reviewers were looking for YA books to review and the remaining 2%, they were looking for YA books that didn't feature vampires or anything supernatural.  What the fuck has gone wrong with this world?  I'm presuming that adults still read books?  And yet everybody seems to have gone mad for YA fiction.  Indie writers seem to write nothing else, as though they think that by having one of their main characters a young werewolf and the other a teenage girl with parents who ignore her will make them a best selling writer.  It won't.  Of course it won't.

I'm not averse, totally, to reading YA fiction.  I read "The Book Thief" a few years ago when it first came out.  Some YA books can be compelling or otherwise intriguing.  But must the Kindle market be saturated with this kind of stuff?  To see a woman in her forties writing YA fiction, I don't know ... it just depresses me.  Clearly, they can write, but their imagination cannot stretch beyond adolescence?

Anyway, I'm doing what most writers do.  I'm digressing (hell, isn't that what editors are for?  To wipe out our digressions?).  Back to Twitter.

Here's the thing.  If Twitter was actually a network for people who were actually interested in what other people tweeted, then we'd probably all be able to sell a few more books.  See, if I see a book advertised and it's something I think I might like to read, I'll download it to my Kindle.  I'll even pay for it.  But on Twitter (unlike Facebook) there is no interaction with the people who tweet.  If you comment on their tweet, they never reply.

The problem with Twitter is that there is a lot of twaddle on there.  And writers, they don't have enough characters in a tweet to say what they need to say about their book.  And nobody can really see what other people have been saying about that writer's book, because everything is so disjointed and unconnected.

I've been getting some pretty good feedback about Besotted.  People have said it's the best book I've written, though it has a way to go to outsell "die Stunde X", my current bestseller.  But can I find a reviewer to give an honest review?  Can I hell.  Well, bollocks to it.  I'm not going to write YA fiction.  I'm not going to sell out.  But here's a thought.  If you're here, reading this blog post, and you haven't read Besotted, you need to ask yourself why.

It's only a couple of quid to download it.  That's less than a pint of beer or a large cappuccino from Starbucks or Costa.  Go on, go here, download it, read it, and then review it.  I love to find out what people think about my books, even if they don't like them.

A writer's retreat?

My good friend Dan Wagstaffe (fellow writer) recently informed me that he's going to take a week out of his life and rent a cottage in Laugharne, the place were Dylan Thomas used to get himself utterly wankered before writing.  His intention?  To be inspired to labour intensely on the book he's currently writing.

I'm jealous.  

Not so much because of the Dylan Thomas connection - I'm more of a Steinbeck/Bukowski sort of guy, and the work of Thomas has never done much for me - but because the notion of getting away from it all to concentrate solely on writing for a week sounds so appealing.

All last year, it was my intention to disappear with a backpack, a tent and a sleeping bag, and do some wild camping, away from modern life.  Write in longhand rather than type.  Pack 7 bottles of cheap vodka, loads of tuna and pasta, and just spend the time writing in complete solitude.  I never got around to doing it.  This year, 2014, I know that I definitely will.  Thing is, should I go wild camping, or should I do what Dan is doing and rent a cottage for a week?  I don't want any distractions.  No Internet, no television (not that I actually watch TV), not even any music.  Just the tools to write with.

I guess there are pros and cons with both ideas.  The main con with camping is that I'm liable to get lost or, I don't know, eaten by a werewolf?  But the biggest pro is that I'll only have to roll out of the tent to vomit up a bottle of vodka after a heavy session - roll out of the tent (bed) in a cottage and puke my guts up, and there's a massive cleaning bill the next day.  But with the cottage, I guess I could take my laptop (sans Internet), and I wouldn't have to type up my longhand manuscript afterwards.  Also, I won't have to shit in a plastic bag, and I can have a shower or a bath every night so I don't end up smelling like a dirty, skanky, manure arse.

2014, I want to write lots.  It's conceivable that I could get a lot done during a writer's retreat.

Or maybe I'd just get pissed every night and lie on my back looking up at the stars.

Things that stop me writing ...

When I'm in the zone, I can write up to 10,000 words a day, though generally I probably hit about 1,500 to 2,000.  On days when I write.  There are so many days, however, when I just can't write.  So what stops me from writing?

Like the majority of writers, I have a day job.  I only work part-time, but all the same, it's something I have to do in order to survive.  As one of my friends recently said, you can only get so far being a struggling artist.  At some point, you have to pay the electricity bill and the Internet bill, and you have to buy food etc etc.

My day job interferes with my creativity.  Generally, if I'm working the next day, I cannot get in the zone.  I can't concentrate or focus on writing.  The thing is, I can write in a busy Starbucks, I can write in a pub with all of that noise going on around me, I've even written when I've been travelling on a train (most recently when I travelled up to York to see good friend and fellow writer Dan Wagstaffe), but if I'm at work the next day, I don't have a hope in hell of being creative.  My day job is sometimes a night job.  I work irregular shifts, and invariably I'm at my place of work for 24 hours.  I can see - and it's more noticeable now, after the fact that I struggled to get my last book, "Besotted", written in over a year - that this job affects my creativity much more than a standard 9-5 job does.  When I worked 9-5, as soon as I left work for the day, my mind was already writing paragraphs.  

In reality, I need either a change of job, or else a bestselling book so I can concentrate on writing 24 hours a day.

But I guess as I haven't written a bestseller, I should adhere to that maxim, "Don't give up your day job ..."

About Besotted ...

You know, when I finished "Besotted" (and it took me almost 18 months to write), I was exhausted.  It was a tough book to write.  All who know me will know that I try to become the character I'm writing about.  In Benjamin Beerenwinkel's case, that meant losing myself in a blur of alcohol abuse (whilst at the same time retaining a sober clarity for my day job).  At the end, I went on a month-long period of sobriety.  I read "Besotted", and I liked it.  However, I've read in 9 times since, and I've cut bits out, hacked away with a red pen, and become frustrated with it.

That last time I read it, I became jaded.  I didn't like it.  I though it was boring, pretentious, self-indulgent (okay, I realize that I'm not really selling the book very well to you).  But the thing is, I was viewing it with the eye of somebody who'd read it 9 times, with the self-critical eye of the creator.  It's only when somebody totally independent reads it and passes their opinion that I know whether or not it was worth writing.

Today, there was a review on Amazon.  The only review.  And it was good.  I suspect the review was written by one of my small circle of loyal fans, but even those loyal fans have criticized my work in the past.  Comments such as, "It was okay, but definitely not your best", "You can tell it was rushed", "poor characters", these have all been leveled at me by fans.

But I learn from that criticism.

"Besotted" is not an action book.  It's not a thriller (though it does have its moments of excitement).  It's a character piece.  I want the reader to like Benjamin Beerenwinkel, to accept his flaws, to listen to his story the way you'd listen to a friend telling you something quite unbelievable.

But as Chuck Palahniuk said (and to paraphrase him, because I can't quite remember how he worded it), once you've finished a book and you've put it out there, you forget about it and move onto the next one.  Even if nobody else likes it, at least I know that one person enjoyed it.

If you've a mind to, take a look at the book on Amazon, and if you're tempted by the synopsis, buy yourself a copy.  Hey, this starving writer needs alcohol so he can finish his next book, "One Eight".

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Besotted-Shaun-Stafford-ebook/dp/B00I36DYKG/

That bloody Kindle thing ...

Here's the thing.  My next book, "Besotted", is complete.  I want it to get out there, into the public domain, to be read by somebody, anybody - just one person or a few hundred people, or a few thousand.  But there's that problem with the Kindle.

If you're a writer who uses Word, then you've probably come across the problem.  That infernal fucking extra line that they insert between paragraphs by default.  I mean, Christ, who fucking writes anything like that?  It looks disgusting on the page, and it looks even worse on a Kindle.  We're quite fucking capable of pressing the "Return" key an extra time if we want that extra line in between our paragraphs, but generally, we don't want an extra line between EVERY SINGLE FUCKING PARAGRAPH.

So, there's the thing.  No matter what I did, the Amazon Kindle conversion was inserting extra lines between paragraphs where I was certain none existed.  Two hours it took me to identify the problem.  It's one of those "But ... ah ... oh, I see," kind of things.  See, I inserted a document with the title page and all of that kind of stuff before the actual text of the book.  Lazily, I'd not turned off that "insert an extra line between every FUCKING paragraph" thing off in that particular document.  So when I inserted it into the start of my book text, somehow, behind the scenes, Microsoft Word saw fit to say that the entire document needed that extra line, even if it wasn't showing it.

Here's the solution - CTRL+A to highlight everything.  Right click on the page, go to "paragraph" and then put a tick in "don't insert an extra line" box.  And while you're at it, switch off the poxy widow/orphan control as well.

Fucking Kindle.  I ask yer ... I don't think Benjamin Beerenwinkel would have these problems!

Happy Birthday to me ...

Writer's are odd people.  Creative individuals whose minds never switch off.  I have a handful of writer friends, and without naming names, they are, each of them, mentally screwed up.  That's not a criticism.  Myself, I'm a manic depressive, which means that I can suffer from vast mood swings.  One of my writer friends is constantly down because he feels that life has passed him by.

Which brings me to this post.

Here I am, on the cusp of my 45th birthday, and I could sit here wondering what I've achieved.  What has been my purpose on Earth?  Oh Christ, let's be fair, do any of us need a purpose to exist on this planet?  We're all, each of us, just a bunch of cells waiting to die.  That's all we are.  What have I achieved?  Does it matter?  I have two fantastic sons.  I've published 7 books.  I make a modest living out of them.  I make films, I act, though neither of these bring in money.  Is money important?  Of course it isn't.  Indeed, when I see somebody driving a Land Rover which has been "Overfinch-ed", I think they're an utter cunt.  I don't respect them.  Why should I?  Who do I respect?  Some of my friends, for their achievements, most of which are far more admirable than the Overfinch-driving Wayne Rooney, who struggles to find two brain cells to rub together, but who kicks a football around a pitch for a week's salary that most nurses will take 10 years to earn.  My friends, the ones I respect, some are wealthy, but most are as poor as me.  But do women sleep with poor men?  Of course they do.  Though I've had my fair share of women who are interested only in money and status, most women I've met are interested in the person rather than the bank balance.

Sadly, I suppose I'm not really a person that women are interested in ...

And there's me on the cusp of my 45th birthday, single, but undoubtedly happy.  Why am I happy?  Because I enjoy writing and creating, and because I have to hand a number of individuals I'm proud to call friends.

Here's to my 45th, on Sunday.  Send me a birthday wish ...

Snobbery against Indie Writers

Let me get this out of the way right now.  I'm an Indie Writer.  I don't have a massive publishing company behind me.  But let's put that into perspective.

The majority of people with a major publishing company behind them - traditionally published writers - get a £2,000 advance, and that's it.  They still have to promote their own work because the major publishing company is too busy promoting Katie Price's latest piece of shit.  Their books sell for £9.99 in Waterstones.  That sounds great, doesn't it?  But they get 10% of the sales from those books, less after their agent has dug their greedy mitts into the royalties.  Less than 99p for each book sold.  And how many books do they sell?  The average first time writer sells between 400 and 1,000 copies of their book, most of those in their local bookshops, where people are intrigued by the notion that somebody who lives in their town has a book for sale in a bricks and mortar bookshop.  Many of them don't get a second book published by their mainstream publisher.

Compare that to an Indie writer.  I get 70% of the royalties from any Kindle sales.  Essentially, from my best seller, "die Stunde X", I get about £1.20 per copy sold.  I have to do my own promotions, sure, but I'm not really a great marketing person.  Have I sold between 400 and 1,000 copies of that book?  Well, yes, of course I have.  Lots of people have read "die Stunde X", which is a fantastic feeling for a writer.  My readers don't just live in my home town.  They live all over the UK, in the US, in Australia, even a handful in the wastelands of Europe, where they speak in foreign tongues.

Recently, I've had people who have denigrated me (and a host of other Indie writers) by implying that we're not published writers.  I.e., anybody can self-publish.  Yes, of course they can.  Anybody can write a pile of shit and put it on Amazon, but the chances are it's never going to sell particularly well.  But in any case, by definition, we're all published writers.  And I'm not giving 20% of my royalties to an agent, and having countless other people profit from my hard work.  And trust me, writing a novel is hard work.  "die Stunde X" was 120,000 words.  My current book, "Besotted", soon to be published, is also 120,000 words.  It's hard work to write something that long.  It's bold and daring to put something so personal as a novel you've written out for public inspection.  But it's downright insulting when people are such snobs that they won't read anything written by an Indie writer.  Typos in Indie books?  Of course there are.  Beta readers don't spot them all.  But conversely, I've spotted countless typos in books by Stephen King, by other mainstream writers, and you know what, I'm not so anal as to point them out in a book review.  Who cares about the odd typo?  Read the fucking book, for Christ's sake.  You're a member of the public who's probably never written a book.  You're supposed to be reading, not proof-reading.  I've even read books by mainstream writers which have read like books written by Indie writers.  Slightly unpolished.

But here's the thing.

Indie writers are the future.  I think it's something like 20% of books sold on the Kindle are written by Indie writers.  That's a big statistic.  So next time you fork out £14.99 for the latest J.K. Rowling overhyped and overly expensive book, spare a thought for the Indie writer, the person who writes from the heart, and who sells their work for a fraction of the price.  They don't have massive resources behind them, so you must forgive their typos, their occasionally flowery sentences.  You must realize that these writers are so enthusiastic about their work that sometimes when they've finished it, they just want people to read it.

That's what writing is all about - getting somebody to read your stuff.  As the reader, you should read it, enjoy it, and then when you've finished it, find another book to read.

So stop being a snob.  Instead of forking out £9.99 for Grisham's latest Kindle book, fork out £1.99 for five books by Indie writers.   You might discover something special.